Now, at first glance, that’s not a massive problem- lots of people fail first time.

Until you ask me what I failed on. My friend’s response was ‘How did you fail hazard perception?’

My driving instructor’s response was that at least I did well on the ‘hard’ section.

And at first I didn’t understand either. I worked out eventually that dyspraxia, the introduction of yet another new drug to my body, and a typical bad flare day (pun unintended) were to blame.

I should have passed. I got a pretty high score on the multiple choice test section (47/50)…..On the hazard perception, I got trigger happy in a blind panic. I can, almost every time (still learning) can spot and react to developing hazards whilst I’m actually driving.

But the past week or so has been a tough one to start with: my GP decided a few weeks back, I should give amitriptaline another go.

What a huge mistake.﻿

I’d been in ‘limping-walking-stick-zombie-mode’ ever since.

Safe to say they soon got canceled as a bad idea.
I’ve been learning to drive for a while now- a while being 3 1/2 years- and only now is me taking my driving test actually a possibly.

I passed my theory test on 19th of October. This was after it was explained to me that looking for hazards wasn’t just my understanding of physical objects like cars and people walking in the road. Oh!

This time I wasn’t trailing new medication, and it was a relatively good day pain wise, so my brain wasn’t hugely pre-occupied. I still had to work really hard to ignore the clicking of other people around me (when I’ve had uni exams I’ve always been in a separate room)

I feel that there should be better training for Hazard perception tests. There’s hardly any prep for them.

I suppose something I have learnt is that, even with all possible barriers taken away, some things will always be difficult. But that also doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try.

I’ve been learning to drive a manual car for almost 3 1/2 years now.

I’ve literally completed my degree in less time.

And yet I persist.

Maybe next year I’ll be driving for real, instead of watching the hazard perception videos?